There is, as a conventional vehicle surroundings monitoring apparatus, an apparatus whereby a camera is mounted on a vehicle, and the distance to an obstacle is detected from a captured image of the vehicle's surroundings (see Patent Literature 1). There is also an apparatus that, in a dark location where illumination of a subject is low, reduces the number of frames—that is, increases the charge storage time of an imaging element—and improves visibility even under low illumination (see Patent Literature 2).